Ian Burrell: Jeremy Clarkson’s tour de farce

Walking in London last week I saw a pair of cyclists in fluorescent jackets, one of whom was Jeremy Clarkson. When I returned 10 minutes later, he had made little progress and was doing a piece to camera at the kerbside with Top Gear colleague James May.

Clearly the intention was to use the helmet cameras to investigate the dangers to cyclists on London’s roads, an admirable subject for the petrol head show, which began a new series last night.

Watching Jeremy close up I couldn’t see how it was a realistic experiment when he was shielded from traffic by a motorcycle, which travelled alongside him with a cameraman on the back. Effectively, Clarkson had his own outrider. But judging by how wobbly he was on two wheels it was probably for the best.